Now with a looming federal deadline for Colorado River basin states to say how they’ll use at least 15% less water from the river, there’s renewed urgency for Arizona, California and Nevada to factor in what’s lost to evaporation.
WASHINGTON — Exposed to the beating sun and hot dry air, more than 10% of the water carried by the Colorado River evaporates, leaks or spills as the 1,450-mile powerhouse of the West flows through the region’s dams, reservoirs and open-air canals.
The West’s multi-decade drought has sent water levels in key reservoirs along the river to unprecedented lows. Officials from Nevada and Arizona say that they, together with California, now need to account for how much water is actually in the river.“It’s very hard to get consensus,” said Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University. She thinks it’s unlikely that states will reach an agreement on their own, without federal intervention.
The Southern Nevada Water Authority estimates that roughly 1.5 million acre-feet of water are lost to evaporation, transportation and inefficiencies each year in Arizona, Nevada and California. That’s 50% more than Utah uses in a whole year.Nevada stands to lose the least under this plan since Lake Mead — the man-made reservoir from which Arizona, Nevada, California and Mexico draw water — sits in its backyard.
For Arizona, that could mean shouldering losses so significant that some experts say the drinking water supply for Phoenix could be threatened due to diminished deliveries to the the Central Arizona Project, the 336-mile aqueduct system that delivers Colorado River water to that metro area and Tucson.
“When you have a junior, right, that’s what you do,” Shields said. “You try to share the problem with other users.”
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